The conference topic was chosen in the wake of Arab Spring and Occupy Wall Street and anticipating dialogue regarding interrelationships among women’s, gender, and sexuality studies and social change. Interest in the topic was fueled anew by activism around the May 2012 passage of Amendment One to North Carolina’s Constitution (banning same-sex marriages and civil unions); the June 2012 silencing of two Michigan Congresswomen, one for using the word “vagina” in floor debates about an abortion bill; and the news that in Ciudad Juárez more women have been killed in 2012 than in any other year of the “femicide era”.